Timmons: Ex-Im Bank Boosts American Products

Yesterday’s Richmond Times-Dispatchfeatured an op-ed byNAM President and CEO Jay Timmons on the importance of reauthorizing the Ex-Im Bank to boost American exports and the economy.

The U.S. Export-Import (Ex-Im) Bank is a vital tool to help grow U.S. exports and increase American jobs. The House of Representatives recently passed H.R. 2072, a bipartisan bill that would reauthorize the Bank and increase its lending authority. The bill now goes to the Senate for a vote. According to Timmons:

At a time of trillion-dollar deficits and runaway budgets, the Bank is sending money back to the treasury. In fact, over the past few years, it earned $1.9 billion of profit for our nation.

Last year, it helped nearly 4,000 businesses in the U.S. export more than $41 billion worth of goods. Those exports support 290,000 jobs in this country, many of them at small and medium-sized businesses.

Those businesses, in fact, are the big beneficiaries of the Bank’s programs—85 percent of the Bank’s transactions directly support small businesses. If these businesses lose the tools offered by the Bank, their opportunities for growth and job creation will diminish.

In today’s global economy—with 95 percent of the world’s consumers living outside the United States—exports are more important than ever.

Ex-Im Bank is operating under an extension that expires on May 31. The NAM is working to pass legislation to reauthorize Ex-Im for the long term and substantially increase its lending authority. Manufacturers need a long-term reauthorization and a significant increase in Ex-Im’s lending cap to restore certainty and create jobs.

Absent congressional approval, the Ex-Im will run out of its funding ability in the coming months, derailing pending sales of U.S.-manufactured products and harming manufacturing companies of all sizes.